


On Fire Growing Old

by bangin_patchouli



Series: On Fire Growing Old [1]
Category: EXO (Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Assassins & Hitmen, Arsonist AU, Arsonist!Jongin, Assassin!Sehun, Assassins & Hitmen, Based on a Fall Out Boy Song, Character Death, Death, EXO AU, Gun Violence, Heavy Angst, Hitman AU, M/M, Minor Character Death, Minor Original Character(s), Minor Original Character(s) Death, Murder, Pyromania, Violence, double suicide, hitman!sehun, or all fall out boy songs
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-06-07
Updated: 2017-06-07
Packaged: 2018-11-10 03:40:25
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,194
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11119149
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bangin_patchouli/pseuds/bangin_patchouli
Summary: A personified wildfire and an icy hitman find a sick kind of love in each other while the life of getaway cars and burning houses surround them. They don't mind it though.-In other words, this is a hitman-arsonist au and possibly one of the darkest things I've ever written.





	On Fire Growing Old

**Author's Note:**

> well. this has been a long time coming. i wrote this for a final project in my creative writing class. it was free write, and i obviously couldn't help myself. this is the main story, the first installment of the hell i accidentally created for these boys. but alas, finally after weeks of writing and then procrastinating the typing of this, it's finally done. i hope to add other stories/shorts in this au verse later on. if you have anything you want to see happen, let me know, because im sure jongin's limits are pretty broad.

_the hitman_

_the arsonist_

 

* * *

 

      _It’s about the life you make for yourself_. That is what Sehun has always told himself, ever since the moment he signed himself away to hushed phone calls and quietly cocked pistols, ever since he held that first cold weight of certain death in the palm of his hand. He’s lived partially unknown, only found by those with the right contacts and the knowledge for what to use him. He’s got a room for his weapons alone, and he's used all of them at least once; it’s considerably more entertaining that way. The sound of scared feet as they trip and the _“please, sir, wait”_ ’s, are all familiar to his ears. This is, after all, the life he’s made for himself. That’s what he used to say.

 

      “Right off Fourth Street?” Sehun murmurs into his phone, waiting for the crackling response of _yes, you can’t miss it_. “Alright, I’ll take it. You know the deal; thirty grand up front, twenty after it’s done. Got it? Fantastic, pleasure doing business.”

  
      Sehun slips his phone into the pocket of his purposefully faded black jacket, silk-lined; he’s earned it. The air changes around him from the still, clean scents of his minimalistic, penthouse apartment to the biting cold of crowded city sidewalks in a matter of moments. His hands are in the loaded pockets now, and the wealthy white house on the corner of Fourth Street is etched into the logically mapped picture of his brain. Of course you couldn't miss Mr. Kang’s house. 

  
      Sehun doesn't really believe it can be considered a house. It’s standing before him now; tall, painted white stone contrasts with the jungle of trees that seem to grow only just outside the city. Dark blue, almost black shutters stand out against the stark white, matching the roof, and Sehun remembers why he thinks he cans see the future when he sees a shadow of himself in the top right window, then the faded momentary flash of fire as gun powder ignites and death in the shape of a black nine-millimeter takes yet another life - only the worthless ones, though. Sehun finds it’s always the worthless ones, the ones who take and take and never give, like a dragon on a pile of glistening gold, that have the most. These are the ones that he takes out. And he knows Mr. Kang.

  
      The weight of his black Ed Brown doesn't feel like a burden in his pocket as he takes leisurely steps toward Mr. Kang’s burly front door. Instead, it feels like an extension of his knife-wielding fingers, a familiar metal that, without a doubt, will get his job done. Every step to the dark stained porch feels like one step closer to heaven, except heaven in this case is heart-pumping adrenaline-rushing feeling thats dispersing itself invisibly through his veins, that’s making his eyes bright, and he knows it, and he's almost to the door. His hand is reaching up to the steel handle, almost in reach-

  
      “I’m not early, am I?” A voice, loud and out of place yet still smooth in Sehun’s ears, calls from where Sehun stood previously on the edge of the well-kept sidewalk.  
Sehun turns slowly, hearing the sleek rubber sole of his black leather Salvatore Ferragamo’s twist on the concrete. He blinks, blatantly, as his eyes draw expectantly on the embodiment.

  
      It’s another man, he discerned that from the voice alone. But from only a first glance, the boy and the voice held little to no similarities. This boy, in contrast to his pleasant, nasally voice, looks rough, in the best of terms. From head to toe, he resembles everything about a personified wildfire. His clothes look ashy, even though they aren’t, and they’re ripped and falling loose over his shoulder and collarbones. He dons boots that look just as intense as Sehun’s whole polished armory. In fact, everything about the boy is intense. He has dark, bronze-like skin that seems as if it’s glowing, as if it’s alight with the fire that’s burning in his angular tawny eyes/ His dark chestnut hair sticks out erratically, and his lips are driven up into a smirk, causing Sehun to see his risen cheekbones. Everything about his radiates vehemence in the worst kind of way. Sehun really can’t take his eyes off of him.

  
      “Well,” The boy prompts, flinging his with hand up. “Am I early or not? Because I don't really know what to do with all this stuff if I am, you know. I got a lot of supplies. Quotations on supplies.”

  
      Sehun blinks. When he opens his eyes again, the boys looks brighter than before. Sehun doesn't blink again. His eyes shift from the boy’s wild, questioning expression to the sizable black bag in his occupied hand. Sehun’s brain is working quickly, and all the dots are connected within seconds. No wonder the boy is on fire; Sehun’s never seen any different kind of arsonist. Sehun smiles.

  
      “You’re fine,” He says, and he can hear the smile in his own voice. “Are you here to clean up the mess?” The boy nods.

  
      “Or to make the mess. I can’t really tell the difference. I’m Jongin.”

  
     Sehun pauses, a moment in critical thought. Even then, he can’t seem to stop his own name from falling out of his mouth.

  
      “Sehun.” Jongin’s eyes light up, in realization this time.

  
      “The hitman. I see,” Jongin says. There really is something about him, and Sehun’s mouth is a waterfall of words again.

  
      “Should take fifteen minutes, tops,” He says, hearing himself speak smoothly,” I’m taking you out after; there’s a nice little joint I have in mind.”

  
      This time, it’s Jongin that blinks.

  
      “Well, I have a job to do, too,” Jongin murmurs, but it’s more like he’s announcing that he accepts Sehun’s undeniable offer. Sehun nods.

  
      “After then,” he says. “I’ll wait. Plus, who doesn't love a good exposition?”

 

 

      Sehun guesses right; it took nine minutes and thirty-four seconds, according to his slate silver Cartier. Of course it doesn't take long, most of it was just silent maneuvering through the complicated first floor. The rest is just light steps up cherry oak stairs stained dark, his Ed Brown showing itself in the dim light of the recently risen moon, and a stuttered, _oh? What are you- God, no! Don’t - bang._

  
      He’s back outside in no time. He doesn't see Jongin, and his heart starts to sink irrationally until he hears a wire break and sees a spark on the right side of the house. Sehun straightens himself, merely disheveled, letting his onyx hair fall naturally and pulling his jacket forward by the pockets in which his hands are fisted. Jongin comes around the corner. Sehun catches a long glance before Jongin even notices, intrigued, and the boy is blazing, except this has much more to do with the wires Jongin’s just connected to the breaker box. He grins when his fiery eyes meet Sehun’s icy ones, and Sehun wonders why he feels more invigorated than ever before.

  
      “Ready to see one hell of a show?”

  
      It takes less than half a nod from Sehun, and Jongin is already two steps ahead of himself.

  
      “Alright,” Jongin says, and he’s so interested in his own words that Sehun can’t help but be interested too. “I set methyl _and_ ethyl around the perimeter; that stuff, especially combined, will blow the outer flames sky high.” Jongin says this with his hand soaring toward the roof, imitating what Sehun imagined to be the future flames.

  
      “Then?” Sehun prods him, and yet again that fire lights in Jongin’s eyes, and Sehun thinks he can see the boy’s veins glowing gold.

  
      “Then! See that breaker box?” Jongin points, and Sehun might be imagining the feeling of Jongin’s wicked passion scattering wildly like glitter from the mouth of someone else over his skin. “I jacked it. One lick of flame, and that sucker blows ever circuit in the house into a tiny little bomb, then this place? Blasted. Nothin’ to worry about but the next job.”

  
      Sehun doesn't blink. He watches Jongin as he produces a lighter from his own silk-lined pocket, suddenly feeling compelled to aid him. Jongin takes his liquid ignition without another thought, like gasoline encased in plastic is his second nature, maybe even his first, and Sehun wouldn't doubt that for a minute.

  
      One crooked, divided grin that spawns from the dark in Jongin’s eyes, and fire sharply sparks dead grass; the place is blazing in seconds, and Sehun feels himself take quick hold of Jongin, taking them both back to the semi-safety of the sidewalk as his eyes are stuck on the scene in front of him. Ardent flames begin to haphazardly consume white paint, revealing burning black stone, and Sehun sees it when the breaker box blows. It sparks out, and suddenly everything is one-hundred times more intense.

  
      It’s all blowing circuits, half-sized explosions, red reflections in shattering windows, and the smaller depraved, animated fire that's igniting itself on Sehun’s right. Jongin, in a way, is much more appealing to look at, his great tawny eyes alive with the fire reflecting inside of them, his smile wide and maniacal, loud shouts of strident laughter emitting from his mouth. Sehun can't help but share his glances between the boy and the fire, both blazing alike, and he decides that he can watch the burning house in the mirror of Jongin’s eyes. After all, how _can_ he look away when he’s never seen lunacy as beautiful as this?

 

      After drinks that night - Sehun isn't shocked when Jongin downs four shots of Bacardi 151; “It feels just like fire, Sehun.” - when the heavy smell of smoke still resides in the air and Sehun can hardly stop himself from taking off his jacket to put over Jongin’s exposed shoulders, everything becomes an unpredictable, hysteric mess, and Sehun knows very little about the path he’s set himself on. The only thing he knows is that he just can’t get _enough_ of Jongin in every way fathomable. He only knows that he feels impulsive and uncontrollable at the sight of Jongin in his heavy boots and that arsonist’s playing in that wild head of his. He can’t hold himself back from touching when that golden glowing skin is uncovered, letting it burn his fingers ever so slightly. And he knows, most of all, that feeling that Jongin gives him, can’t seem to stop giving him, lights him up the way nothing else ever has, ever could.

  
      That’s when he starts calling Jongin much more than he should. Every late night job call always entails Jongin as an immediate thought.

  
      _‘I got another job tonight. Want to make another mess?’_

  
      Jongin hasn't turned him down once.

 

      It’s late tonight. Sehun hasn't had a job in a while; it’s not a priority, not right now at least. Outside the city, the stars are out, twinkling so distinctly that Sehun sees when Jongin has to blink twice to see them clearly. The natural light, cool and metallic, looks odd as it shines on on Jongin’s usually so warm skin, lightening the gold of it to a rose color and making him seem almost, _almost_ chaste; Sehun doesn't mind. He skims hands over Jongin’s burning body anyway. It still feels the same.

  
      The sky moves quickly, at least it looks like it’s moving. Really, it’s the train below them that’s speeding like a rickety tin bullet through the unreliable shadows of two a.m. dark. As the stars flash past, the moon, white and shining, follows them, and Sehun yet again finds himself seeing everything through the reflection in Jongin’s eyes.

  
      “Sehun,” Jongin says into the wind as it blows past their ears, and Sehun secures his grip around Jongin as if he isn't already in a different type of danger, the kind that you can see with a single glance in Jongin’s direction. Still, his hands stay firm around Jongin’s waist, a half false sense of security.

  
      “Yeah,” Sehun answers into Jongin’s ear, shifting his gaze to Jongin’s plentiful pink lips.

  
      “You know I’m a pyro, right?” Jongin asks, like he needs to know in order to keep himself sane, and Sehun blinks. He hasn't put time into that thought, even though it’s always been there, in the back of his mind. He finds that he doesn't really mind. If finding pleasure in fire makes you a pyromaniac, then Sehun might as well be one, too. After all, it’s Jongin who's leaning, tense, against Sehun’s chest.

  
      Jongin once told him, in between lighting a match and letting it fall into a spill of gasoline, that he was in love with every aspect of fire and the way it burns. Sehun knows exactly what he means, but he’s never said _I love you._

  
      “I know,” he says instead, lips steady against Jongin’s neck.

 

  
      In recollection of himself before Jongin, Sehun has always loved the fast pace of the life he’s always been living. That hasn't changed; Sehun still loves the rumbling sound of a getaway car waiting outside. He still finds dark pleasure in hidden handshakes over secret dirty deals. He still feels powerful when he walks the midnight streets, where everyone he knows will bend to him because it’s been that way since he made his name in the south side of Baltimore. He makes big jobs, but he knows he can take them. He knows that Jongin is a spitting sporadic mess; that’s obvious. That just adds him to Sehun’s list of nefarious loves. But he’ll also know it isn't Jongin’s fault when his next job ends up being his last.

 

      “Ni,” Sehun says from over the white marble bar in his kitchen, hands hovering over rose tinted glasses as he mixes Martini’s, per Jongin’s request.

  
      “Yeah,” Jongin calls back, voice held short. He’s in the middle of a surprisingly graceful handstand against the wall in Sehun’s living room. His white button up - Sehun’s white button up - is slightly too big on him, half undone and falling down into his upside down face, and he doesn't have shoes on.

  
      “I got a call last night,” Sehun says, coming around the corner with two frosted glasses in his hands and a spark lighting in his stomach. “It’s a triple; heist, hit, and burn.”

  
      “Is that so?” Jongin asks, mock slyness smoothing over his voice as he completes a one-eighty to land standing, his eyes barely meeting Sehun’s as he straightens, a grin playing on his lips. Sehun matches him with a half-turned smirk.

  
      “It is so,” Sehun tells him, setting down the glasses with a staccato clink on the swirled marble table. The look in Jongin’s eyes is nothing new, not the gleam of clever gold, and the vigorous feeling that grips Sehun isn't different either. “Are you in?”

  
      “Am I ever out, babe?” Jongin asks, rhetorically, a fiery mischief radiating from him as he trails his finger up Sehun’s bicep, and once again, the boy’s fire is spreading. It only draws Sehun in more, like a moth to a flame, and Sehun thinks that metaphor fits oddly well. He leans closer to Jongin, the scent of the other boy, a warm, hazy smell, wafting into his nose. His lips are right by Jongin’s ear when he whispers,

  
      “Never.”

 

      “Got everything, Nini?” Sehun asks, turning his head around from where he sits in the driver’s seat of a stolen, stark black Cadillac CTS-V to watch Jongin load his equipment in the back seat.

  
     “I don’t forget things, _Sehun_ ,” Jongin answers, emphasizing Sehun’s name, and his tongue is protruding from between his lips. Sehun feels a smile reach his own eyes.

  
     “Then get in.” Jongin does.

 

     Sehun isn't sure where it went wrong. They’d gotten in alright; the building was outside legal limits and huge, only grey stone, tall and wide, with no windows. Sehun had tricked out the scanner with two credit cards, and his map led the two of them through the empty, maze-like hallways. Only once did they come across another human being, one security guard, and Sehun did not take his infamous time on taking him out. He thinks it might have to do with the fact that Jongin trailed right behind him.

  
      The destination room was small and square, solid white walls surrounding a pedestal in the center of the otherwise empty room. Upon laying his eyes on the case sitting there, dread began to roll in waves around Sehun’s stomach. Realization was coming in sharps shocks of lightning, and Sehun felt like escape was slipping through his fingers like blood from a victim. This was not what they had signed up for; this was not just a hit and run. This was real danger, and Sehun cold feel Jongin’s heat behind him like an oven had been left on in the room. Sehun turned to face him.

      _‘Go; now,’_ he’d said, hearing his own voice, low and commanding, Jongin nodded, and now they’re running the halls again, but this time the only goal is escape.

      Sehun’s lungs are forcing his air in and out with a burn as he listens to their shoes on the floor, pounding, and watches Jongin dash in front of him. His shirt becomes damp, and his nails are digging into the palms of his hands. His mind is racing faster than they are, but all it’s saying is _run_.  
Sehun almost stops when he hears the oh-so-familiar clock of a gun as it loads, but he doesn’t. He only speeds up and shoves a hand at Jongin, shouting _Go!_ , and and the exit is just within reach.

  
      Two more steps until Jongin can reach out and open the door that gives them a chance at freedom, but only one before Sehun hears the even more familiar shattering _bang_ as a bullet is released from the barrel of the gun, but this time it’s aimed at them.

  
      Sehun sees as Jongin crashes into the door, forcing it open and covering them both in splintering moonlight as they fall through the threshold. Sehun doesn't need to speak; Jongin is busting it to the passenger side of the Cadillac as Sehun is starting the engine.

  
      They leave dust flying in the air as the car shoots seventy miles per hour on spot, and Sehun knows what he’s gotten himself into. He doesn't want to admit how it’s going to, inevitably, end, not when he feels Jongin’s hot hand twist, trembling, into the fabric of Sehun’s pants, nails scraping against his thigh. He doesn't want to have to tell Jongin, but when he looks over at Jongin beside him, he sees he doesn't have to. Jongin’s wide eyes and the look inside them tell Sehun that he already knows.

 

  
      Jongin’s eyes aren't wide anymore when they pull up to a house that’s been long forgotten. It’s just broken brick, falling apart; no one will mind when Jongin destroys it. Inside, it’s nearly empty. The shattered windows let in as much light from the barely rising sun for as Sehun needs to see everything clearly enough. The cheap wooden stairs are collapsed in a heap at what would have been the foot, aged dust settled over the rot of it like a final sentence. Pink floral wallpaper is peeling off in faded shreds, and to Sehun, it looks like it’s silently begging to be obliterated. It reminds him of Jongin. The antiquated floorboards quiver in vibrations under Sehun’s feet when Jongin drops his bag on them. Sehun doesn't mind.

  
      “Nice place,” Jongin murmurs, but he isn't looking at the house. He’s standing in front of Sehun, eyes fixed, as Sehun slowly swivels to do the same.

  
      “Tell me about it,” Sehun replies, voice low, meeting Jongin’s eyes on fire. Except this time, the fire is blue and Jongin is shaking as he kneels to the floor and pulls one of his special breaker boxes out of his back. He sets it gently, unlike him, on the floor between them, and takes a can of gasoline out along with a box of Rosebuds. He stands up, black garments shifting, and Sehun’s ice cold heart is beating on fire for the first time in his life. Except, he wishes it wasn’t. He wishes instead that he could watch Jongin’s heart, like he always did, where it beats on the tips of of his fire-felt fingers. Jongin uncaps the gasoline, and Sehun reaches, unblinkingly, to the waistband of his pants, feeling the intimate metal as cold as ever beneath his fingers. For the first time, the Beretta feels heavy in his hand. When Sehun looks back up, gasoline is spilled around them like a circle, as if they’re trapped now. Sehun watches as Jongin pulls his handgun from his own waistband.

  
      “At least yours is prettier,” Jongin says, and Sehun almost wants to smile.

  
      “I don’t mind that you have bad taste in firearms,” he says quietly, his voice much smoother than the ocean of anxiety that’s raging inside his chest.

  
      “I’m going to-.”

  
      “Jongin, I lo-.”

  
      “Please don't say it,” Jongin says, his string of words a rush of hot wind, and for the first time, Sehun sees his fire fade. He doesn't want to see that again. “It makes everything less real.”

  
      Sehun nods. “Okay.”

  
      The thing is, Sehun is not afraid to die. He does not fear the idea of death as it reaches its skeletal hands toward the living to make them not so. He is in terms with himself; he knows what awaits him. He is not afraid of death, or the afterlife. No.

  
      But as he looks at Jongin, drinks him in like he’s the last beautiful thing Sehun’s ever going to see, because he is the last beautiful thing Sehun’s ever going to se, he wishes it had turned out differently, wishes for a different outcome, just a little bit.

  
      Jongin opens the box of matches, letting one play between his fingers before he strikes it roughly against the box. Sehun wonders when his hands started shaking.

  
      “No counting,” Sehun mumbles, and he cocks his gun. It sounds sharp when Jongin does the same. “But we go at the same time, alright?” Jongin nods. Sehun tries to memorize the art-like framework of Jongin’s face, his wide, curt nose, his full lips that are stuck between his teeth now, his long lashes as they lay atop his unblinking eyes, alight again, but this time in silence. It doesn't take much to tattoo that image to the backs of his eyelids. Sehun feels his heart beating, but it’s not beating for himself. “It’s okay.”

  
      Jongin raises his arm as Sehun raises his. The other holds out his hand with the burning match, and lets it fall, like a feather from a phoenix. The gasoline ignites into a mournful, yet still emotively wild dance, and Sehun can feel the heat of it against his legs. His eyes don't leave Jongin’s. He sees Jongin’s throat move up and down, and he’s never wanted to hold anyone more than he does right now.

  
      _Now or never_ , the back of his brain reminds him. His inner arm touches with Jongin’s, and even the tip of Jongin’s Glock is warm against the skin of his exposed temple. Sehun’s index finger lies in gruesome wait of the trigger below it. He can feel the gun shaking in Jongin’s hand against his head.

  
      “Say it,” Jongin says suddenly, and even his voice is on fire except this dire, it’s fading fast.

  
      “I love you, Jongin.”

  
      The bullets leave the at the exact same time as the breaker box below them ignites into a formulated explosion, and everything is turned into a beautiful wasteland, into Jongin and Sehun, dual bodies aflame with nothing but two guns, one-thousand sins and each other, all but ashes as they fuse.

 

  
      In the end, it doesn't really matter that they’re gone. Nobody is heartbroken, or upset in the slightest, not even Jongin and Sehun themselves. Baltimore is rid of its hitman-arsonist duo. Its streets are finally free, but so are they, free in the wind as it blows them away as the one they’ve become.  
      Sehun’s apartment stands empty in eternal silence. Jongin never really had a home, but his cologne still exists between the wrinkles of Sehun’s sheets. All of their marks are still there, exactly where they left them. Every fire they’d ever lit still holds its ground into the form of angry, insurgent burn marks, black and bold.  
      And really, all Jongin ever wanted was a fire, all he ever needed was a match. Sehun held that purpose, and the bang with which he took them out is one that Jongin would be proud of.  
      _It’s about the life you make for yourself._ That’s what Sehun used to tell himself, when really it’s only about the way you take yourself out, and Sehun went out with Jongin’s forehead against his own and a last I love you on his lips; out with a bang, an arsonist’s dream of all dreams. That’s all that matters, in the end.

 

**Author's Note:**

> well shit.


End file.
